Kindergarten to Olympics

KINDERGARTEN TO OLYMPICS

Dr. Rajiv C. Sharangpani

MS(General Surgery)

Diplom Sports Medicine (Cologne, Germany)

1. Background

2. Social environment

3. Priorities of the Government

4. Educational System

5. Sports Syllabus

6. Restructuring of the existing Sports Format

7. Planning for the year 2024

8. Talent Search in Sports

9. Health, Fitness and Performance

10. Prevention, Treatment and Rehabilitation

11. Training, Testing and playing equipment manufacture

12. Team Olympics

BACKGROUND

The only background of our quest in Olympics is one of repeated disasters. These so called disastrous results are because of false expectations much like expecting a calf from a nonpregnant cow. If at the appointed time the cow does not deliver it is not at all a disaster but simply wrong assessment of the situation to start with. This being the case it is very essential to appreciate that we all are responsible for the present situation vis a vis Olympics. Olympics are simply a mirror of our attitude towards performance and efficiency in present social environment. There is no use of finger pointing and blaming athletes, coaches, trainers, associations, office bearers etc.

We must become aware of the present situation.

Awareness is continuous, simultaneous, nonjudgmental and total perception of our internal and external environment. We must, without break, perceive our internal or mental attitude towards Olympics and the external situation as it is now. This perception should be simultaneous; because the external environment always affects our internal environment and both modify each other for the better or the worse. We must be nonjudgmental in our perception; because judgmental attitude leads to perpetual loss of vital energy. Appreciation and judgment are two different things. We must appreciate that we are breaking our heads against a wall but we cannot say that this wall is the cause of our trouble. If at all it is possible, we must perceive things totally as they are inside us and outside us. This of course is the enlightened state. I doubt if any society was ever so enlightened. All the same we must try.

SOCIAL ENVIRONMENT

Disadvantages: Olympics require a very specific attitude towards performance. This is essential in the preparation and execution of the given task which in this case is winning medals. Here is what our society has to learn a lot of things from the major medal winning nations. Our society has no appreciation of performance because well directed discipline is not our strong point. Our society was described by John Kenneth Galbraith as “Working Anarchy” There is no description that is more apt. We are fun loving people in a general way. Our way of managing things is extremely uneconomical. We do not appreciate talent as such but we appreciate the label attached to that talent more than the talent itself. Cast, creed, religion, and connections take precedence over talent in most of the cases. The story of Eklavya is repeated in Indian sports. You do not get medals because you are related to somebody or you are from the same cast as the selectors. Efficiency is not a word in our vocabulary. If it were so all the office bearers of various organizations which are directly related to our efforts at Olympics would have relinquished their posts after one term. On the contrary people stick to their positions till death much like the old man in the house who doesn’t give the keys to anybody else till his death. Abiding rules is something we laugh at. We have forgotten that the agitation launched by Mahatmaji involved breaking rules of a foreign power. We are continuing to break our own rules. We do not obey traffic rules. Red light, no entry carries no meaning for us. Olympics are if nothing else extremely disciplined sports events on the earth. We do not come and go on time. Olympics are all about perfect timing. We are experts at developing short cuts. There is no short cut to Olympic success.

We celebrate festivals and do not compete properly because there is no need of any particular discipline for the celebration. Chaos and not order rules our lives. Olympics are all about order and competence.

We are all emotional people. Our social responses have little logic to back them. Thus we do not have the ability to critically analyze our failures. We erect monument for our victorious athletes and destroy them the moment they lose. If we cannot analyze we cannot synthesize either. The success stories are synthesized from the analytical demolition of our failed strategies. We do not appreciate this and go on repeating the same strategic mistakes which have given us a rich harvest of failures.

Women who form fifty percent of our population and who are probable more capable of management than men in India have always taken a backseat in social context. In Olympics even now women can make us proud earlier than men as the gap between Indian level and Olympic level for men and women is still manageable in women’s events. However dress codes so stringently applied in our country for ordinary women restricts their psyche in such a way that no Indian woman can be comfortable in the dresses worn by women in many disciplines. The male attitude towards participating women is more of ogling than of encouragement. On top of it women are harassed by various people on their way to anything simply because they are females.

One of the sentences written on the walls of Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi says“Participation and not winning is important” It is ascribed to Pt.Nehru and it must have been taken out of context. At kindergarten level participation is more important than winning but at Olympic level winning is all important. This attitude of “participation only” is disastrous to say the least.

We take decisions by consensus. Even if we have Einstein amongst us he will have one vote as far as policy decision is concerned. Everybody may agree to what he says and then use the word” but” and vote against him. Success stories are written by one visionary and not by a politically wrangling committee or group.

Advantages: Our sheer number will be overpowering to all the sporting nations. Our ability to respond emotionally to any situation if well directed can cause serious challenge to world athletes.

PRIORITIES OF THE GOVERNMENT

Sports is obviously not the priority of any government which has ruled the country and rightly so. In fact no government has any priorities whatsoever. Priority is something which is not there in our dictionary. Otherwise health would be our top priority. We are experts at exploding bombs, sending rockets, developing software, but not at giving clean air and water to people, building safe roads, giving clean unadulterated food, giving good housing, giving good education. I forget that there is a priority of every single government and it is unadulterated incessant politics. One, obviously, gets the government one deserves. Thus we must indict ourselves.

Health is the first step towards fitness which then can lead to performance. If we are a sick, undernourished, dehydrated people how on earth are we going to achieve fitness?

There has to be one concerted effort towards health. It is not by distributing medicines and vaccines that we are going to be healthy but by giving clean air, water, food and housing as a first step and then giving free access to various enjoyable physical activities to a vast majority of population.

EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM

Our educational system is biased towards mental gymnastics than physical gymnastics to an unhealthy extent. We learn by rote”Healthy mind in healthy body” but never practice it. In fact preaching without practicing is the motto of our educational system. We know great ideas, theorems, concepts and we enjoy discussing them till our bodies are tired but never once do we think of adding those in our day to day life.

This has to change. Half of the time children should be in the class room and half of the time they should be on the ground, if available, from kindergarten till they are bachelors.

Fifty percent of the credits should be for mental disciplines and rest for physical disciplines. There should be as abundant a choice as possible for selecting either of the disciplines for the students which will automatically throw up immense talent in mental as well as physical disciplines.

SPORTS SYLLABUS

“How early is early?” is a good question for the introduction of a sports syllabus. The answer is immediately after birth. Theoretically this is alright but practically in our country a child is considered a ball of clay which needs molding with little consideration to the fact that ball of clay is lifeless and a child is alive and literally kicking. A child may be compared to a living plant. Our job is just to give correct quantities of air water and manure the rest will be managed by the tree. We must be observant that any of the things which we are providing the sapling is not harming it.

A sports syllabus involves introducing the child to various enjoyable movements as her life progresses. Immediately after birth a child can float. Gradually running, jumping and Gymnastics are introduced as mother disciplines and then by the age of eight to twelve ball games etc are introduced. In this introduction emphasis is on enjoyment and the game child enjoys most is the game of choice.

A Sports Syllabus for Your Child written by the author of this write-up with Mr. G.S. Hasabnis in 1985 is probably the first book of its kind.

To the best of my knowledge there is no sports syllabus worth mentioning in our country’s schools.

RESTRUCTURING THE SPORTS FORMAT

The existing format of the sports disciplines in our country is in shambles as is evidenced by our performance at international level. It needs to be restructured. All ancient relics like NIS should be properly dismantled and out of the pieces new organization should be allowed to evolve. We must prioritize our sports expenditure.

Olympic disciplines take top priority and even in those games individual games take the highest priority. This is from purely cost benefit point of view. At the moment we are not in a position to make one person fit enough claim a gold medal in Olympics. It is misplaced optimism to think that we can produce a team of fit individuals to get a gold medal. Even if such a thing happens all the money spent on these individuals gives us only one medal. If the same amount of money is spent on as many individuals we stand to get that many medals. Even in individual games; games which require skill like shooting and archery take topmost priority as these games come close to Indian psyche.

Thus games like hockey and football should be left to fend for themselves. Government should not spend even a single rupee for these disciplines.

Second priority should be for Indian games. However only those disciplines which can be modified into an Olympic individual discipline should be sponsored by the government. Thus wrestling and Indian martial arts should be encouraged but team games like kabaddi and kho kho should not be sponsored by government.

Foreign coaches are paid exorbitant sums to train our athletes. This is a serous mistake. If at all these coaches must train our coaches. Our athletes must be in our hands whatever the merit.

Exposure to competition must be a routine affair till the approach of Olympics preferably in the same climate as the Olympic city.

Training, testing and exercise equipment must be manufactured in our own country. Every industry in the top hundred industries must choose among the equipment necessary for our athletes and produce top quality equipment. Government can give tax exemptions or other incentives for the same. Our dependence on foreign equipment is frightening. This equipment must be made available to our sportsmen in a large quantity.

Sports and culture should totally separate as their requirements are different in the Indian context.

PLANNING FOR THE 2024 OLYMPICS

We must start for the 2024 Olympics right now. Any earlier target is ridiculous given our mediocre status. To elevate the whole structure will take minimum twenty years if not more. It will start with identifying individual discipline which should be our priority in the 2024 Olympics. Establishing training and testing all over the country is the next step. Then the talent search should begin for the said disciplines in the relevant age group which will be around 18 to 24 years of age in the Olympic year.

This group should be gradually refined by eliminating lesser talent till the year 2016. From the year 2016 training should be started in earnest for the next eight years.

In this way we can start establishing ourselves as a big player in international sports field.

TALENT SEARCH IN SPORTS

Talent in our country is abundant. We have a mine of different body types suitable for individual disciplines. It must be obvious to any keen observer that athletes from various disciplines look entirely different. Thus sprinters, marathon runners, gymnasts, weight lifters, wrestlers, all look entirely different. One cannot fit into any other discipline.

If we identify these athletes when they are six to twelve years of age then we can say that we are on the right track. If we wait for the chance to throw up top class athletes we will get them once in ten years. We must look for them and then look after them.

If one lakh children participate in any one sport then eventually a world class player emerges. We must make our numbers our asset.

We have a vast number of physical education colleges till date useless as far as our Olympic quest is concerned. They produce BEd’s and MEd’s worth nothing. They can be gainfully employed to reach a large population of children in talent search.

HEALTH FITNESS AND PERFORMANCE

As already mentioned the chosen children must be looked after as well as our own children. Most of them are never going to make to the Olympics as they will fall by the wayside as the more talented will surge ahead. Only very few will reach world level and fewer still will succeed as gold medalists at the Olympics. They should be gradually directed towards more suitable careers.

Health is the ability to enjoy life. We do not enjoy life on a day to day basis, hence we need festivals artificially arranged to enjoy. Sports’ training is paradoxically hard but very enjoyable. This aspect in our athletes is just not emphasized enough. Our training is only hard resulting in burn outs, injuries, overtraining; all leading to poor performance. The technical aspect of training e.g. How to throw a javelin has to be enjoyable so also the non technical aspect like improving strength in the body to throw it longer.

Our fitness training methods are exceptionally poor because those who teach them do not know how to combine physical, mental and spiritual aspects of training for a given athlete and a given discipline.

Actual performance needs extremely careful preparation regarding the above three aspects and other aspects like biorhythms, diet, sexual management, jetlag, sleep rhythms, social adjustment, media management, and many more technical aspects depending on each individual.

Fortune favors the brave. If it is true; the performance has to be spontaneous and only the brave can be spontaneous. All said and done an honestly aware preparation regarding health, fitness and performance is all that we can do rest is our fate. Here it is best to understand the relationship between fate and effort. Both are interrelated and finally one realizes; one is the other.

PREVENTION TREATMENT AND REHABILITATION

Our sportsmen show a lack of understanding and confidence in our own technical experts.

This situation is partly due to the inability of real experts to show themselves up even as fraudulent experts with no knowledge masquerade as sports medicine experts. Sometime the original is difficult to separate from the copy. We do have good people but they need proper training. Simply being a player and then becoming doctor does not automatically make you a sports doctor.

We must organize a national level training facility to train all our doctors the principles of managing and preventing sports injuries.

TRAINING TESTING AND PLAYING EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURE

Now a days no Olympic discipline is simple. Every single Olympic discipline requires either some sophisticated equipment for training, testing or actual participation. Unless these equipments are manufactured with highest quality and in large quantities in our country at a cheap price we have a real challenge in Olympics.

We have all the necessary technological expertise in high performance technology. We must exhort our top hundred industries to manufacture these items. These items will be from running shoes to biochemical testing machines to badminton rackets and special playing surfaces. Once these are available in plenty our children will take to high standard sport like fish to water.

These units must be made available according to regions and their anthropological characteristics. For example in Manipur and Mizoram mesomorphic body type predominates. Here weight lifting, wrestling equipment should be manufactured. Kerala predominates in athletically suitable body types so that equipment should be manufactured there.

TEAM OLYMPICS

A Team Olympics should be configured which will coordinate the above mentioned activities for twenty years under the guidance of a visionary, competent, non political person with least desire for self aggrandizement.

Team Olympics should start with establishing either one or all three facilities namely, a four hundred meter track, Olympic swimming pool, Gymnastic hall in all the district places.

It should identify areas for establishing training, testing and playing equipment manufacturing units.

It should coordinate efforts for talent search in sports.

It should establish a national center for Prevention Treatment and Rehabilitation of Sports Injuries.

An entirely new set of training Institutes should be established at places where the climate is moderate and suitable for training.

Coordination and interaction between foreign coaches and our own coaches should be supervised by this team Olympics.

EPILOGUE

The above mentioned project is obviously a team effort. This team needs guidance from a visionary. Although in Olympics we should not participate in team disciplines the preparation of each and every athlete in individual disciplines requires a team effort. Given our individual brilliance it should not be difficult for all the like minded people to lift our nation from the abyss of nonperformance due to inefficiency in Olympics.